


The Worst Day Since Yesterday

by Em_Jaye



Category: Captain America - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, Bucky Barnes Feels, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Canon Divergence - Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Darcy Lewis Needs a Hug, Djinni & Genies, F/M, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-10
Updated: 2021-03-10
Packaged: 2021-03-17 16:21:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29969076
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Em_Jaye/pseuds/Em_Jaye
Summary: Happy Birthday, Bucky Barnes.
Relationships: Darcy Lewis/Steve Rogers, James "Bucky" Barnes/Natasha Romanov, Wanda Maximoff/Sam Wilson
Comments: 29
Kudos: 75





	The Worst Day Since Yesterday

**Author's Note:**

> Oh hai. I've written maybe...two? Fics? Before? With our sweet Bucky Bear as the main character? Despite my unending love for him.
> 
> But back in January, my lady love, Grimey, challenged me to lean into my love of the Buck and write something where he was the star. So here we are, because I can't say no to that girl. <3 
> 
> This will be a drama in three acts

Act One

_Well, I know, I miss more than hit_  
_With a face that was launched to sink_  
_And I seldom feel, the bright relief_  
_It's been the worst day since yesterday_

_-_ flogging molly

March 10, 2024

Bucky Barnes didn’t care that it was his birthday. In fact, out of all 102 birthdays that he had been around for, and the twenty or so he could remember celebrating, Bucky wasn’t sure he’d ever cared less about the calendar flipping from March 9th to March 10th than he did that year.

Which was convenient, really. Since no one else cared that it was his birthday either.

No, that wasn’t true. Wanda cared. Wanda cared enough to have left him a little potted plant and a birthday card outside of his bedroom. He saw it when he opened the door. A cactus with a single red bloom at the top and a card with a cartoon dog and a slice of cake with a candle. _Happy birthday, Bucky!_ Wanda had written in her curly, loopy script. _I hope it’s one to remember – Wanda_

He put it on his desk and offered it a little smile, despite his low mood. He didn’t know how Wanda had found out, but considering he’d watched her reconstruct the Avengers’ compound using swirls of red magic she conjured with her hands in only a few hours, he guessed discreetly figuring out someone’s birthday wasn’t the most impressive thing on her resume.

Sam might have cared, but as far as Bucky could tell, Sam didn’t know. And Sam was his teammate. His partner for most missions—so much as there were any—and the other person rowing with him in this bullshit canoe down the river of _Now What?_ But Sam wasn’t really his friend.

Not yet, anyway.

Maybe someday.

There were only two other people who would have actually cared that it was his birthday. Would have made sure to mention it—made sure they celebrated it no matter what end of the world nonsense was falling down around them—but…

Well.

Bucky closed and locked his door behind him and went for a run, hoping that when he returned, there wouldn't be quite so many reminders of the rain cloud hanging over his head. Bucky was starting to consider it a good day if he could go most of his waking hours without someone reminding him of the people he was trying his hardest to live without.

But when he returned an hour later, sweaty and wanting a shower, he saw that—birthday or not—by this new metric, a good day for Bucky was simply not in the cards.

Dr. Darcy Lewis, five feet, six inches of mostly hair, lipstick, and glasses, had become a common fixture at the compound in the eleven months that had passed since Steve failed to return from returning the Infinity Stones.

Only, as Bucky had tried to tell her again and again and—as recently as three weeks ago— _again_ , Steve hadn't failed to return. He just didn't come back. He hadn't planned on coming back. He told Bucky as much the night before he left. He told him he loved him, but he'd been waiting for a chance to go back since he'd woken up. He had to know what he could have had with Peggy. He had to see her one last time, at least, and make sure she was happy. Make sure she had the life she really wanted.

It had made him sick to think about—the thought of Steve waltzing into Peggy's life after so long and disrupting what she might have had without him. He knew what she'd had. He knew about Sousa and their kids and all the thing Peggy had accomplished while Steve was in the ice. It didn't feel right. It felt selfish. Short-sighted. Not like the Steve Bucky had always known.

But maybe outliving an apocalypse by five years was enough to make anyone unrecognizable. Even a man you'd known for more than a hundred years.

The problem with Dr. Lewis was first, that she hadn't known Steve for a hundred years. She'd barely known him for five. The last five, specifically.

Her second problem was that, despite knowing him for the last five years, despite whatever relationship they seemed to have had, Steve had made his decision to go back to Peggy without informing her.

Maybe it was because their relationship was more casual than Darcy wanted to admit. Maybe it was because she was summoned to the Peak Station to consult with SWORD as soon as Nick Fury was in solid form again and he hadn't been able to reach her. But whatever the reason, when she'd returned to the compound a few weeks after Steve had blipped from the quantum platform, it was with genuine confusion and concern that he hadn't returned.

And the third problem with Dr. Darcy Lewis was that, for all her brains and brilliance, the poor girl didn't seem to be able to take a hint.

He’d been polite at first. Even bordering on friendly. She was, after all, a sweet woman, smart and capable, and they had someone in common. But his patience with her theories had run out months ago and everything that could have made her a friend, an ally in this fresh hell, had evaporated along with it. All her harping and insistence that Steve had gotten stuck somewhere, all her studying and theoretical recreating of what they’d done with traveling through the Quantum Realm…it was irritating at best. Pathetic at worst. And it was making the possibility of any of them moving on—from Thanos, from the Snap, from Steve, from any of this—impossible.

“You don’t have to come with me,” Darcy was saying, sitting across from Sam at the kitchen counter. There was a cup of coffee in front of her; her long nails, the color of red wine, drummed against the side. There was a crescent stain of dark red lipstick against the rim.

“No, it’ll be a nice change of pace,” Sam replied easily. “I’ve been up here too long. I miss the city.”

“Well,” she curled her hand around the mug again, lifting it to her lips. “It’s still a mess. Don’t get excited. It’s not like we’re going to be able to go see _Pippin_ after we’re done.”

Sam made a face. “I hate _Pippin_ ,” he said, making her snort a laugh into her coffee. “Now if they said they were bringing _Phantom_ back—” he looked up as she laughed again, noticing Bucky for the first time. “Hey, man,” he said with a nod. “Good run?”

“Yeah,” he shrugged. “It was fine. Where are you going?”

“Nowhere,” Darcy said.

At the same time Sam answered, “The city.” There was a heavy pause before he glanced between them and cleared his throat. “You should come with—”

“I’m good,” Bucky said immediately.

He said it so fast, he almost missed the way Darcy said, “That’s not necessary.”

Sam looked almost amused as his eyes darted between them again. “Uh, I wasn’t finished,” he went on. “You’re not good. You got a call from Foggy. He’s got some stuff he needs you to sign?” Everything inside of Bucky heaved a sigh, half-resentment, half-resignation, even as Sam went on. “Darcy and I are heading out now, but just text me when you’re done and we can meet up. Fury’s been on my ass anyway about sitting down with us both. Might as well kill a bunch of birds at once.”

“Sure,” he heard himself saying, almost against his own will. “Sounds good.” It sounded awful. “I’ll get a hold of you.”

He started down the hall before either of them could say another word. Despite the distance, he could still catch the sounds of Darcy finishing her coffee while Sam broke the silence. “He’s not that bad, y’know. Once you get to know him.”

“I have gotten to know him,” Darcy said as Bucky reached the end of the hallway. “And he actually _is_ that bad.”

He unlocked his room, shed his clothes, and started the shower in his bathroom, turning the water on as hot as he could stand it. He let it run over his face, filling his mouth before he spit it out and turned around to let it soak his newly cropped hair. He thought he’d miss his long hair, but he didn’t. It felt like so much these days, like it didn’t fit. Like it had belonged to some other man. Bucky had spent too much of his life fighting the memories of other men who wore his face. Kind and charming men who used to go dancing. Dangerous, silent men. Monstrous men who killed without conscience.

He shook the water from his hair and reached for the soap, trying not to think about Sam and Darcy and thinking about nothing else.

 _He actually_ is _that bad,_ Darcy had said. Without fear that he’d overhear her. Without a drop of regret.

Bucky ran the bar of Ivory soap over his shoulders. The familiar smell was comforting.

He didn’t blame Darcy for hating him. He’d said some pretty ugly things to her the last time they’d spoken.

_He’s not stuck somewhere, Darcy. He’s just gone._

It wasn’t the first time he’d said those words to her. But like every time before, she’d already started shaking her head, ready to argue. “How can you say that?” she’d asked, unfolding her feet from beneath herself. “How can you just accept that?”

He could have been nicer. Kinder. Gentler. More patient. But he’d reached his limit long ago and she seemed intent on seeing just how far she could push him. “Why _can’t_ you? I’m sorry you thought you meant more to him than you did, but—”

She’d been on her feet, pointing a finger in his face before he could finish his sentence. “No, you don’t get to say that,” she’d snapped. “You don’t have any idea what you’re talking about. You don’t know what we had—the things he said to me—"

And that was the moment he’d snapped. “I know he _left you_ ,” he’d barked. Loudly and with enough force to shock her into silence. He should have stopped at that. That was enough. But he didn’t. He’d kept going. All his own hurt and disappointment and confusion churning up somewhere in the back of his throat. All fresh and new and raw again because Darcy couldn’t see what was right in front of her face. “He left all of us. What about that isn’t sinking in for you? We didn’t matter, Darcy. Not you. Not me. Not Sam or Wanda. None of us. He found something that he wanted more. And he left.”

He had expected her to smack him. Part of him had wanted her to. It might have helped the immediate regret that swept over him as soon as the words passed his lips. But she hadn’t. She’d stood there, her eyes wide, her mouth open a fraction of an inch like he’d been the one to raise his hand instead. She’d blinked once. Twice. And then gathered her things, her laptop and notebooks, and left the compound.

He hadn’t seen her in three weeks. Until today, when she made it clear that had been a fight that they weren’t going to get over.

But that was fine, Bucky told himself as he toweled himself off and started to dress again. He didn’t need any more friends. He had plenty. His eyes fell to his desk and the little cactus. He had almost one friend.

That was more than enough.

***

His meeting with Foggy was mercifully short. More of Steve’s affairs to settle but nothing to send him spiraling into anything worse than his sustained gloom. He bought himself a soft pretzel to shove into his face while he walked from the law offices of Nelson & Murdock all the way down to the village. He tried not to groan when he saw where Darcy’s quest for answers she wouldn’t listen to had led them.

Sam was inside the New York Sanctum, sitting in the center of the grand staircase, managing to look at home even surrounded by most of the magical, mystical objects in the hemisphere. Bucky envied that about Sam. He always looked comfortable. No matter where they were.

He smiled when Bucky stepped over the threshold and the heavy door shut behind him. It was only a little warmer inside than out and despite himself, he shivered in his leather jacket, almost wishing he’d worn a scarf. “Hey, there he is,” Sam said, as he away the phone he’d been playing with.

Bucky looked around. It was like being inside a museum. A museum where almost everything was still alive in one form or another. “Darcy got Strange to meet with her, finally?”

Sam shrugged. “I guess so. Girl makes a few good points if you actually listen to her.”

He looked up from his boots. “I’ve listened to her, Sam. I just don’t think she wants to admit the truth.” His attention was drawn toward a table closer to the eastern corner of the room. He felt himself start walking towards it, even as he kept talking. “I can’t believe she’s got you believing her bullshit now.”

Sam got up and brushed himself off needlessly. “I didn’t say I believe her,” he said quietly, making Bucky wonder if that was true. “I just don’t like the idea of her doing all this entirely on her own, y’know? I mean, she was Cap’s girl at some point while we were gone. I kinda feel like that should mean something.”

“Seems like it means a lot less than it used to,” Bucky muttered, not really paying attention to Sam any longer. The artifact that had caught his attention was nothing special. A swirling dark blue orb perched on the pinnace of a small, bronze pyramid. It seemed to rotate on its own, winking at him each time it caught the light. “Do you know what this is?”

When he finally tore his eyes away, Sam had raised an eyebrow. “No idea. Probably not something we’re supposed to be touching though.”

“I’m not going to touch it,” he grumbled like a petulant child. “I was just wondering.”

Sam looked around, squinting in the dark room before he bent, looking closer at the base of the pyramid. “Only word I can make out on this is ‘Solomon’,” he said. Before Bucky could reply, Sam straightened, his hip barely brushing the table. Without warning, the orb teetered off the tip of the pyramid before it crashed to the tabletop and rolled down to the floor, making a sound like thunder. “What the fuck—”

Bucky rolled his eyes. “Don’t touch it, Sam,” he groused, surprised when it rolled away and then seemed to turn to roll right back to his feet. “Just throw it on the ground like a softball.”

“I hardly even breathed on it!” Sam exclaimed, holding up his hands. “You saw the whole thing!”

He sighed and bent to pick it up. It was warm to the touch. Impossibly smooth and felt like it was vibrating against his skin. “Jesus, what is—” he looked up, surprised to see that Sam’s eyes had gone wide, his expression twisted in concern. “What? What’s—”

But before he could ask what was wrong, Bucky felt a shock from the center of his palm, a white hot flash of heat pour over his whole body as an acute ache blossomed behind his eyes.

And then everything went dark.

**Author's Note:**

> Thoughts? Mebbe some...commints?
> 
> I keese you.


End file.
